Dumpster diving, also known as trashing, is another popular method of social engineering. A huge amount of information can be collected through company dumpsters (trash can).

  • The following items turn to be potential security leaks in our trash: 
    • company phone books which can give the hackers names and numbers of people to target and impersonate 
    • organizational charts contain information about people who are in positions of authority within the organization
    • memos provide small tidbits of useful information for creating authenticity
    • company policy manuals show hackers how secure (or insecure) the company really is 
    • calendars of meetings may tell attackers which employees are out of town at a particular time 
    • system manuals, printouts of sensitive data or login names and passwords may give hackers the exact keys they need to unlock the network
    • disks and tapes can be restored to provide all sorts of useful information
    • company letterhead and memo forms

Source: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Fundamentals_of_Information_Systems_Security/Access_Control_Systems
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Last modified: Thursday, 15 April 2021, 2:49 PM